Wonderful Life With the Elements Imagines the Periodic Table as People

Let’s be honest: Sometimes, the periodic table can seem a little daunting. There are so many elements — and more getting added all the time — and only a couple of letters to tell them apart, making it difficult to tell your Copernicium (Symbol: Cn) from your Cerium (Symbol: Ce). Thanks to a book by Japanese artist Benpei Yorifuji, there’s now a much easier way to identify the elements: Check out their hair and fashion sense.

In Wonderful Life With the Elements: The Periodic Table Personified, Yorifuji makes the many elements seem a little more individual by illustrating each one as as an anthropomorphic cartoon character, with distinctive hairstyles and clothes to help readers tell them apart. Nitrogens have mohawks because they “hate normal,” for example, while noble gases have afros because they are “too cool” to react to extreme heat or cold. Man-made elements are depicted in robot suits, while elements used in industrial application wear business attire.

“When we saw the book and his amazing artwork, we knew that we wanted to publish an English edition,” said Tyler Ortman, an editor at the book’s American publisher, No Starch Press. “We think that there’s an amazing opportunity to make science, technology, and math accessible to any reader, especially kids. Fun artwork and a little narrative go a long way towards engaging readers in topics that might be otherwise threatening or too abstract… We’ve tried to retain the playful spirit of the original.”

While the English language adaptation of book was in production, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) actually named two new man-made elements, Flerovium and Livermorium. Fortunately for completists, however, Yorifuji was able to create new illustrations in time for the new printing. Feedback for the book has been good, according to Ortman, with particularly positive reactions from chemists, teachers, and scientists.

You can see more from Wonderful Life with the Elements in this preview; the book is available as a print edition and an e-book from No Starch Press.